Flesh and Bone

Gr 10 Up—When his parents announce their divorce, Bill moves with his mother to the rural Oregon town where she grew up to live with her parents. While she works long hours waitressing, Bill falls in with a group at school who hang in "the Pit." Soon he enters in to multiple sexual relationships, with girls and boys as well as a friend's uncle. He self-medicates with alcohol, marijuana, Oxycotin, and later heroin, partly in an effort to assuage his own depression but also in keeping with his friends' social habits. Told in short chapters with spare dialogue and lyrical prose, the story is less plot-driven and more of an evocative character piece. Somber and meditative, the story is told as a series of snapshots, leaving readers to draw their own conclusions about the source of Bill's pain, whether it be his parent's divorce, father's abandonment, difficulty coming to terms with his attraction to men, or his inability to connect emotionally. The explicit sexual content combined with profanity and extensive drug use make this a better fit for mature teens.